Beijing 3

Wednesday was wedding day in Beijing. I had the morning free. It was nice to relax and give the feet a rest from the Summer Palace. In order to give our feet rest and avoid walking, our Beijing FOC hosts took us on a short bike ride to breakfast. Not just any breakfast, a western breakfast at "The Bridge." The adventures began early on this day. We Wuhaners don't bike because the traffic is horrible and I would take my life into my own handlebars everytime I went out if I biked in Wuhan. Not the case in Beijing. The only problem, or should I say challenge, was that we didn't have a bike for every person going to breakfast. You see they had 4 bikes, but 8 people. "No problem," they said, "we will just dink." Dink? What is this dinking? Pretty soon they were throwing around phrases like, "I'll dink you," and "do you feel alright being dinked?" Dinking-the act of pedaling/riding a bike while someone else rides on the back tire. I was not going to sit on a bike while someone else pedaled so I dinked Megan. She caught a picture of my friend Andy who was being dinked on the bike ahead of us.

 The wedding was in the afternoon, in the Old Summer Palace. This is a different one than yesterday's excursion. It was a large park where ruins from the palace remain. The 40 or so attendees walked in together and found a nice hill, tucked up just enough so as not to create as much attention. 40 foreigners together is enough to create a stir, but add a bride in a white dress and a full blown wedding, now you have chaos. We anixously awaited the bride's arrival as we stood on our little hilltop under the pavilion which would serve just fine. Finally, the bride came and her father escorted her up the hill. There were invited guests and plenty of uninvited guests who took pictures and video while crowding around the little hilltop shelter. We sang Amazing Gr-c+ to end the w-rsh-p. Indeed, how amazing is his undeserved love for us. Love that brought these two people to the King of kings. Love that bound them as one with Him as their foundation. Love that brought all the guests there safely. I couldn't help but lift up my head to the skies and say, "Praise G-d from whom all blessings flow!" How wonderful and great He is.

The evening was capped off by a wonderful dinner and celebration for all the undeserved love shown us that day. After the festivites concluded, I saw the Olympic Park all lit up at night. Beautiful buildings and engineering feats. I experienced how beautiful this city is. Great things are being done through the h.s. there. Give thanks to the father today for all of the blessings he is showering upon China. It was a nice night and a wonderful day. Our G*d is an awesome G*d.